Okay How do you know if a varity can take the sun? Is it that the dark leaves can and the light leaves cant. I hate to sound crazy. i know plants just very new with coleus.Last summer was my first. I had some Beautiful ones I had just started collecting. I know they were sun coleus. I unfortunatly lost over hafe my plants when My Gh froze about 3 weeks ago. I lost all The coleus!! I have to start all over trying to round up some. Anyhow any tips on what to look for would be great. I have part sun part shade and full sun.
Kinda new to coleus
I'm new to this site so others probably have a better answer, but Rosey Dawn's website has a list of varieties which can stand some or a lot of sun.
Don is right and here's a link to the Rosy Dawn Selection Guide:
http://www.rosydawngardens.com/Selection_Guide.aspx
Dappled shade is safest if the variety you want to grow isn't on the list.
I've also found that "sun tolerant" for coleus and other plants means one thing for the sun in Minnesota or Oregon and another thing entirely for the sun in Florida, or south Texas. I'm two years new to Florida, and I'm still putting a lot of plants in pots rather than the ground so I can easily move them around to find out how central-Florida sun tolerant they are.
Helen
I'm in the same boat. Starting collecting coleus last summer and through "lurking " on the coleus threads, and through trial and error, learned what works and what doesn't.
I'll tell ya one thing, I e-mailed Bernard Gebhart at Gebhart's Greenhouse.com and asked him about 100 questions-not really expecting an answer- and He e-mailed me back all kinds of info that has saved a lot of my coleus so far through this winter.
Also Dale the Gardener who pops in on this thread from time to time answered a lot of my questions.
You can't always go by wheather the leaves are dark or light as to wheather they like sun or not. The vast majority like high-indirect light.
Heres a "rustic-orange: that can take full fla. sun but ya gotta keep it moist.............
I have found direct NewYork State sun will turn greens to yellows in some varieties like Glory.
This is Glory with Mahogony Giant I would call it a full sun area at least 4 hours pr.day
Mola- I wish I could say that. The hotter the better is the way I like it.
when it hot, you can always find a place to cool off---
but when its cold, its cold everywhere............
this was part of my yard last summer.....
this is it today...
but it will come back - it always does
and I thought Florida was a lush tropical jungle all year round.lol
normally we have a couple freezes(temps at 24 or more for 8 hrs.), one in jan., and one in feb. and thats it. This winter was a worse case senario in which it was mid-20's EVERY NIGHT for about 10 days in a row.
For us central fla. people it was absolutely brutal!!
I could show a lot of examples but suffice to say, a lot of stuff froze to the ground this time around--which is practically unheard of around here.
many depressed gardeners around these parts.
we hope that was the worst of it---we're not used to taking cuttings in the fall to grow in the house until next spring-what a hassel!!
I'm doing an experiment right now to see if cuttings will root any faster if the water and surroundings are kept at 70-80 degrees and 12 hrs. of grow light every day................
ge1836, no, Florida has many climates, and isn't so tropical sometimes. Especially a little north of, say, Ft Lauderdale. They just had two freezing nights!
9a, wow, that's not 11 like I have. But then, you get a respite and can clear and weed and mulch easily. And I don't like it too hot, either, 95 is my limit!
mola- I use 2 parts hyrogen to 1 part oxygen!!LOL
I've also got a styro-cup full of older stems I threw in just to see if they root with no keaves on them--experiment #584:~))
sofar-after about 2 weeks they do seem to be rooting faster than with colder water--I'd say about a week ahead of others out in the greenhouse where temp is controlled from 55-70 at nights
when it was really cold a few weeks ago, I did get some leaf drop on about 25 out of 100 plants, but I couldn't keep the greenhouse any warmer than 60---dad-blamed cold!!!
I am installing a wood stove tommorrow... seriously.